A/N Hey guys, not much but plot being set up in this chapter, some feels to pass on though mainly, but do not worry, action will soon surmount in the following chapters, and I hope to continue to do so, until climatic end, which I hope to bring a good note to your hearts.

I thank you guys for reading, all your views and support help me keep going, keep writing this fic, no matter what happens, so keep 'em support roll'in!

Also, before you read on, I like to thank you all for getting Shattered Memories off Amazon, I still need more people to download it to get recognized though- I sadly can only lower the price to 0.99 cents instead of free, because it won't let me make it free anymore-so please, even if you don't read it much, just check it out, I hope to keep writing for a long time, and bring better content here because of it. Sorry if I'm push'in it though...

Anyways, I'm glad you came to read, so enjoy the chapter you wonderful bunch :^)

Chapter 11

Reflection, Destruction, Consolation

My eyes saw only the dark, blackness, that which I could not understand, and pain throbbing at the ends of my digits and extremities. All ten fingers and ten toes, they hurt like hell-fire had nipped them off, and all I have known due to this, is the seething suffering of it all, for the past month. Or was it a week? Maybe it was a year. Time...it means little to me now, as time does little but heal my wounds, that which are only made anew in the absence of Yamori. In fact, time was my enemy, just as pain was, for as soon as they came back, and the ebb of agony began to fade, he would return, and snip them once more.

Tears that had at once spilled from mine eyes, that which accompanied my screams of horror, were all dried up, both the tears and my screeching voice having failed to gather that man which I sought as sovereign. His sun-kissed hair, that whiskered visage of hope, was lost unto me, for he may be a hero, he may be able to destroy things on grandiose scale of which too, I will never understand much like the rest of his obscure past, but he is not all knowing. He is not omnipotent. Sadly, he is not omnipresent.

Naruto is only a man.

I blame him not of this great suffering, one that had come from sudden expenses of Jason and his whim to collect my flesh. I have come to realize something from this, learn from my experiences here, as all do from misery. For I now see who I used to be, as a child, for before my torment, I only saw the world as comic, where the universe laughed with us in good nature. We would get hurt, brush ourselves off, move on with our lives.

I discover'd here, within my anguish, that this was a fat lie.

I am no more as I was then-though however minute may be the old me now-but here, presently, I only see the cruel, unfair world that I had not anticipated upon in my early days, the veil of lies still held over my gaze then. I will not retract my earlier statement concerning the world, but paramount to it, I say, the world is indeed comic.

But the joke, is on us.

The world does not care for us, it ignores our suffering, for I have seen ghouls who must scrape by to live, and I have seen those cruel ones whom prey upon the weak. I have witnessed with my gaze, humans who could so easily die, to humans with such determination that they would fight for all justice. Of these dual things, I reject, all their realities, and substitute my own, as much as I had rejected telling Naruto of my experiences with the unfair and cruel when I was around him.

A ghost, a hallucination visited my once upon a few especially anguish-filled 'sessions' with Yamori and his pliers, my mind meanwhile escaping to a white, pure ivory, world, as my body screamed and twisted in pain, it was this visit that brought me to a final decision. My mother, just as that time after fighting Nishiki, had come to me, and I found myself enamored in the memories past, gripped by what the specter spoke of. I dejected her words at first, denying what she spoke of, that what my mother did was wrong, and there-by extension, so too was what my decisions were that were tantamount to hers, to be hurt instead of others, was wrong. But that all changed when Jason brought in the couple, brought in those two ghouls, of the three that tried to save me, who had pitied me.

Screams and pleas from everyone-except the torturer himself-were echoed 'cross the black and white tiled floors, their deaths however, were forever etched into my gaze in such a way that it would still rebound with such haunted and terrible sights beneath closed eyes. When my mind drifted, I could still see them, hear them die in gurgles of fear and hate. The ghost of my vision, of my deceased mother, came to me once more thereafter, and spake unto me, in her less frightening visage and of a brighter smile, of a parable that I now-through all that I have seen and been through-cannot deny in any sort as nothing but the truth.

"Those who are strong, they have the right to make decisions. Those who are weak must obey and suffer for not protecting themselves. Won't you decide though, Kaneki, decide who deserves to suffer?"

After this, from that pearly world within my subconscious, I broke from my chains, broke from what was holding me back, my own humanity, and I 'devoured' the power, the strength and will she spoke so fondly of, that she represented, washing my world that once was white, now with crimson, bloody truth.

I left humanity behind, and have accepted who I am, a ghoul, so that those who I decide that suffer, are the rightly ones to suffer, and not those who do not deserve it, remain in my protection, no matter the cost, no matter what I have to lose of myself, even what made me, me. Now, I sit, in that tiled, red beamed structured building, in the real world with a real perspective that was not but the truth. I wait now, in chains I can so easily break, waiting for Yamori to soon return, to collect my flesh and screams for his benefit and sick pleasure, when night would surly set, I will break free. For I am new. I am stronger. I have the right to make these decisions.

I am Ken Kaneki, no less, but now, so much more. Soon, as that wretch even now opened the doors far across the tiled floor, I smiled on the inside, ready to prove to the world that I am not to be made fun of. The very thing the world neglected to protect me from, would soon be defeated, devoured, and his strength would be mine. He came towards me, bearing that archaic tool against me, but I showed no fear, for I was finally ready to let those who deserved to suffer, suffer.

Away, in the Twentieth Ward, when twilight approached, and soon the cold night was to set in, Naruto Uzimaki turned atop his apartments roof, feet turning on the ledge that he had climbed, eyes wide open. He had come here for a month now, ever since Kaneki left for answers about her mother. He always watched the streets and horizon beyond, hoping-praying-she would not end up regretting her decision. His hand itched towards the pronged kunai he had hiding beneath his orange and black jacket, tempted for a few weeks up till now to simply use the thunder god technique to see her, but Naruto forced his hand away.

She was her own person, she didn't need him popping out of no where and disturbing her...though still, he wanted to see her again.

Naruto shook his head, ridding himself of this thought, instead, he continued to stare, out to the distance, the chill of night that would soon come biting into him. Recently, as since after Rize stating that she was willing to be with him, with Kaneki, he could not stop thinking about the mere prospect. Honestly, he had yet to do anything of any sort, unless counting the coffee they drank together, and conversations they freely shared. Naruto enjoyed them to a great extent, learning more and getting closer to one such as Rize was quite a string of tales close knitted with blaring escapades. Though, as she had come to admit, her nature before the clowns captured her was un-amiable, and of such that she regretted now. Rize went on stating after the fact that she still had more to regret, looking forward to the prospect, as, 'its just apart of life, I'd rather lead a bountiful one than none at all.'

He laughed then, and chuckled beneath his breath now, remembering it.

Then there was the case of Kaguya, whom always remained placid, or so she wanted to appear at least, for though her face remained stoic, her lips ever so slightly curved upwards, as if she didn't want him to know. Oh but he did, and thus he smiled too, oh how he smiled like never before. Kaguya, the one before, had done away with his friends, leaving him with nothing but rage and undying fury, but now, this new genial Kaguya, she has stripped him of any purpose, disarming him of anything to accomplish. Without friends, without purpose, all he had was the three girls, the cafe, and the occasional job he would pursue to get money for that months budget.

Naruto, once standing, now decided to sit along the edge of the building, thinking back against the painful memories of his friends demise. It stung, remembering, but he forced himself too, because he would be amiss to forget them. All the adventures, the battles they shared, the pain they endured together, it all came to the end of the shinobi world as they knew it, but he cherished these memories just in the same token that he grew sorrow over it. He regretted it, but that was what made it oh so sweeter.

These memories, of them, no matter how painful and how much it drained him, were all he had left of them.

Leaning back so that his back rested on the rooftop, his legs still dangling on the ledge, Naruto's gaze fell onto Kaguya, whom stared at him with that faint, hidden gem of a smile upon her red lips and porcelain face. She had been watching him think, watching him morn, watching him as he was for some time now, at a general distance, a respectable distance, one he cared little of, for he minded not if she crossed over to him and sat next to his resting head.

"You miss her." Kaguya spoke, so soft and gentle, a chime in the calm summer wind came as her voice.

"You can tell?" Naruto, half-jokingly said, throwing his arms on either side of himself, splayed out.

"Yes." Was her quick reply, her red lips broadening in a simple smile, her feet picking up and gliding her form over towards him on soft trodding heels. She did indeed sit next to him, but did no longer stare at him, only into the distance which he had aforementioned gazed at earlier, towards the ever expanding horizon, so full of promises yet to come, yet were there and seen, just out of reach.

"You should go to her."

Naruto looked up, and from his view he saw her basked in the dying light, a star child in her own right. Propping himself up onto his elbows, Naruto smiled at her. She turned her head towards him, and leaned down, almost grinning. This really was a different Kaguya, one who stared deep into his gaze with only a gentile grin accompanying her lips.

"Pretty, I've never noticed it before, but, you're very..." Naruto shifted on his knees now, kneeling by her side, leaning into her as well. "You like me too, like they do, don't you."

Her grin fell back to an almost coy smile, trying to force her own lips to only, faintly, curve upwards.

"Just go find her, I'm sure she misses you." She told, pushing him with her shoulder good-naturedly

Naruto stood, nodding.

Out of his jacket came the pronged kunai, and just as soon too, he was gone in a flash of yellow light. When in an instant moment later, Naruto opened his mouth to greet Kaneki, wherever she should be, of whom would have had a wide and stark look of surprise on her face, but his voice did not come out. Kaneki was no where, and in fact, he had no idea where he was either, just some dirty alleyway, trash laying in wet sobs of clumps everywhere. Naruto looked along the alley, and finally found the kunai he had given her, its surface covered in mud. He picked it up, wiping the surface off with his pant-leg, putting the blade away in his jacket.

Something was wrong, very, very wrong, he felt his skin crawl now as his senses picked up a long lost scene of horrible events. Gaze flashing about suddenly, like flies bounding in a glass chamber that was his head, Naruto searched for what was disturbing the area, what was out of place in this mess of an alley and cracked brick walls of weathered and molded origin. His head snapped to the side suddenly, and he caught sight of what he was hoping for. The bricks and trash, on the side of the alley he stood opposite of, was pushed in, matted, cracked slightly was the bricks-compared to the fissures that formed along the whole of it due to lack of maintenance-as if someone were slammed into the buildings side, against the grain of other fissures.

"No." Naruto's mouth became dry, mind racing to any other possibility but the one that made the best sense. He could so faintly, despite the other more distinct smells of trash, smell the iron of blood hanging along the crevasses of that slightly caved in wall, and he remembered that smell too well, from when he saved Kaneki from Rize, the first time they had met. Blood was all over her then, and he picked it up and knew it from memory. Then, Naruto knew all too much, and he could not bare the thought of what he knew, no more did he want to, the implications far exceeding what he wanted to accept.

Then he smelt something new, different.

Naruto's eyes widened, and he recognized the smell as non-human. It was male in variation, ghoul in origin, and all too strong in the odor was it that mixed amist the dirt and trash. It pervaded this alley as if the man was still here, still beating Kaneki until...until she-

"No, no not again!" He gruffly screamed, teeth gritting together, seething with rising rage, realization of what happened forcing his wrapped up fury to once more rise to the surface. Never again! He thought, flashes of memories consuming him as the weight of his failure, to protect the lives of everyone he called friends, forced him to his knees, his fists beating into his own head as his eyes scrunched up in pain. Hinata, Sakura, Sasuke, Kakashi, and so many more, all just...gone.

And it was all his fault!

His eyes snapped open, crimson slits of swirling rage, rage against himself and everything, for another person he cared for, under hisprotection, was dead, and it was his fault because he was a failure. He didn't even offer to go with her, thinking she was to be fine, and he failed because he didn't consider the dark world he lived in. It was because of this, these maddening thoughts engulfing him, that Chakra began to manifest around him, soon erupting in a miasma of sapphire and sinister scarlet, that which like a typhoon, swirled about him in a mix of passionate fury. Naruto never realized when he was screaming, but he felt his vocal cords become course, rough like sand-paper. Naruto never realized how much he could hate then. Naruto never realized how far gone he was until it was too late.

Kurama shuddered inside the seal as he felt such that Naruto did.

Amber eyes flashed away the scarlet, slitted pupils became crosses, and the lines of whisker's that were upon the blonds face grew thick and large, becoming black blocks of tripled marks across his seething face. Kurama's golden cloak burst about and around him on will, the two Chakra's of both beast and six path sage mode advancing in great power that forced the building to shudder like twigs in a grandeur storm.

And Naruto launched straight up, heaven-bound, passing the building that had once loomed over him. Naruto's nose twitched, and his head snapped to that side, instantly his form bursting through the air in break-neck speeds, heading that direction. He zipped about the star-lit sky as he followed the zigzagging scent trail, like a drunk firefly he was. Those below, humans or ghouls of any kind, all of which heard the screams of rage, shook in fear of what that thing was that passed overhead, that which they barely, so briefly, glimpsed upon.

Naruto did in fact smell Kaneki as well, but it was faint, eclipsed by the stronger scent of that other, full-fledged ghoul, the sick bastard-in Naruto's mind-having eaten and taken her body for more to eat later. With bearing such a thought amongst other hatred fueled inklings, his flying form flung itself even faster, now but a streak of gold across the star-lit and cold laden night.

A collection of buildings was what came to sight, all either eclipsing the other in height, but he ignored the rest, as he found the building holding the one he hated best. Cold concrete, glass windows, and steel beams, all shattered upon contact with him, his body a wrecking ball on steroids that could do no more that rip asunder what took construction crews months, in a matter of milliseconds that seemed instantaneous. A white and black tiled ground came upon him, though soon it was laden in a large bowl of destroyed ceramic and base cement, a crater the size of which expanded the size of a house.

Standing with rage shuttering limbs, Naruto stepped out of the crater, alofting in the air and drifting above the cracked floor, stopping before a much smaller bowl of indented ground, there contained the man, the wretched ghoul of which he held most animosity for. He remained still, unmoving 'cept the quite, almost dying, breath that moved his back up and down so very slightly. He was stripped of most of his clothes, and held scratches and gashes still healing along the whole of his form. The ghoul looked as though he had been eaten partially as well, but so enraged, Naruto didn't even notice.

"Where's her body." Naruto ground out, hoping to at least bury her, knowing full well the man still remained awoke.

The man shifted in the crater, just enough to look up at Naruto, and his eyes widened, realizing just who this being who stood in his midst was. A presence, no mere man, more a force of nature, a rage and storm brought down upon by the very lights of a gods gaze. A cloak of gold that which burned and wisped at its fringes, etched in seething black flames, and in this godly fi'ger, Yamori saw several black orbs, each easily the size of a fist, and a staff with a ringlet mounting the tip of one side remained gripped in the tightly knuckled mans fist.

Jason had little chance, especially now, to survive such a strange and ancient god as Naruto seemed to be, after what Kaneki did, just leaving him with one, single Kagune at his disposal. Without thought, he deployed it, the once hidden limb flashing out in great speed, the scythe tip somehow easily piercing through the gods chest, the squelch of flesh being rendered inside out and of divine blood spilling forcing all to be subject to the sound, his only hope though it was. Despite this injury, of what should outright kill a man or ghoul, of what was supposed to be fatal, of these things that should have occurred, left Naruto unfazed, his rage still swirling in angry swathes of dark hate. It took several moments passed before Yamori to realize he had made a mistake.

"You're done."

And thus after, Jason, Yamori, the man who sought strength through the consumption of his own kind and a half-ling, knew what true pain was soon enough. It was not just physical, it was not purely just that, instead, he came to know what the wrath of a deity was, however shallow time was for his life it may have been. The blond snapped his hand up to the Kagune that still pierced him, wrenching it out and holding it in a vice grip that could not be pulled from. With that, Naruto let loose a stream of lightning nature Chakra, his sage of six paths mode allowing such of any kind.

Bones churned to dust, and Naruto burned the mans Kagune with fire jutsu. Yamori's skin was reduced to cinder, ash and dust to forever be no more, but of such an endless and slow perspective did the man perceive all of this, that it was naught but agony personified, suffering that his teeth ground together in gnashing pain.

And then Jason knew no more, oblivion before a timeless gaze, one of numb and endless hollow eyes.

Naruto was all that stood in that ruined, black and white tiled, red beamed room, realizing he was now but in a womb, and it was this place and the occurrences that took place, that for now, and from here forth, through all he had ever been through, Naruto was changed. He had tortured a man, no matter how cruel, with his own rightly gifted power, for he left the man in dust that scattered upon even the slightest of drafts.

Yes, something changed, snapped within Naruto that day, however brief his rage was, it still remained, now only falling behind a prevailing sorrow that soon churned inside of himself. It would rise again, one day, he knew, and on that day, utter hell and all things terrible in his might, will be reduced to nothing. It would come now, no matter what, but for now, he could only mourn. Naruto let go of the cloak, and of the six sage paths mode, letting all he was wash away in tears that gathered in sorrow for yet another lost loved one. It happened once before, when after Kaguya did away with his friends, and anger was all he knew then too, and it seemed that like before, he teared up in pain, despite his wound already healed. He failed to keep his promise, to protect her, like he failed to protect the others. He saved Rize, saved her and killed the man who harmed her, destroyed the group that captured her.

Naruto turned on grim heels, downcast in melancholy he knew of only once before, and of before he had hope not to repeat, but failed in such pursuit. Kaneki was dead, the man responsible, was dead, his hate still ever growing, and he had no one but a few left to account for. With them, he could still look after, and hope he could manage their lives more carefully, and maybe be more attentive to the cruel world he had forgotten existed, that still haunted his nightmares in silent screams of love long lost and forever no more.

With what he left behind, his old self, Naruto reached into his orange jacket, grabbing hold of what was his gift to Kaneki. He held its flashing surface to his face, her name glaring into his teary gaze. Naruto wiped his tears from his eyes, and held the pommel of the ninja tool to his temple, held a piece of what was left of Kaneki to himself, and with it, flashed away in silent sorrow.

Naruto opened his gaze when he knew he was back inside the apartment, inside his bedroom, he blew a sigh, wishing to know no more. Walking over to his computer desk, he opened the drawer, putting away his gift to Kaneki in utmost reverence. He grabbed a seal from there as well, closing the desk drawer, laying the parchment across the floor a few feet next to his bed. Adding Chakra, out poofed in existence a bed, clothed in sheets, a pillow to lay ones head.

"Kaguya," he called out, "you're beds ready, I-I'm just gonna go ahead to sleep. I didn't find...her."

He found himself holding back tears, choking on short sobs, but he held them, shifting on sodden feet towards his bed. Getting under the sheets, facing the wall and back to everything else, Naruto closed his eyes, his ears twitching slightly when the floor boards creaked, but did not move, didn't look, knowing it was Kaguya going to bed.

Strangely, she did not hop into her bed, instead, she slide softly into his, wrapping her arms around his chest, holding herself into his back. She moved little more, and said nothing, and he asked what she was doing, but still she held her tongue. "Kaguya, I don't know why you're doing this, but please I...I just don't wanna talk about anything. Leave me alone."

She remained silent.

"Please," he insisted, "Kaneki...she's not around anymore, so just, please, leave me be for a while will ya."

Her arms only grew in their embrace, holding him ever-closer.

"Kaguya, I don't want you to comfort me, I miss Kaneki, nothing's gonna make it better, so just-" And Naruto finally turned his head back, losing his strength in his jaw, gaze widening in disbelief and utter amazement.

"I miss you too, Naruto."

Kaneki leaned into him, tucking her now white haired head into his back, a calm surrounding her, forever in his comfort and dept. He was the reason she learned of her ghoul half and was able to deal with it, all due to his smile and assurity, friendliness, and heart that seemed stitched on his sleeve. He stuttered, shifting his broad shoulders and body about in her tight embrace, staring now into those dark grey orbs.

"How did you-"

Silence took his lips just like Kaneki did, loving him with what she knew in herself, taking in his face after pulling her head back. Smiling, she brought her hands to either side of his face, brushing remnants of tears away with her black nailed thumbs, leaning her temple into his.

"Because I took strength in myself." She answered, continuing with, "Without even being there, you made me stronger Naruto, your mere absence still giving me power to overcome, because you were gone, despite everything that happened. And-" she paused, bringing her head into the crook of his large, ever weighted shoulders, chin held in the crook of his neck, whispering into his ear-

"-no matter what happens, or whoever is in our lives, with us together, I will always love you."

Naruto found his arms wrapping firm around her as if she was to fly away and never be seen again, embracing her ever-closer. He would come to find out, upon rousing the next morning, of all that truly occurred in the past month, of what she had been through-all the torture-and of her revelation. Naruto learned she had escaped after defeating Yamori, coming here after releasing the mans other prisoners, the ones that tried to help her-of who still were in her dept and under her will, willing to fight with her for what she sought now. But most importantly, he found out that upon returning, she talked with Kaguya, who told her of Rize, and of what he had planned on asking her when he saw her next. Kaneki accepted it, he was startled to find, but was all the more happy for it.

Happy, he chuckled in thought, because through and through, for once in a long, long time, he had captured true joy, one he thought was long since gone.